Royal Navy Submarine Museum

The Royal Navy Submarine Museum on Haslar Creek is one of the best museums of its kind in the world, tracing the history of submarine warfare from its earliest experiments to the nuclear age. The centrepiece is HMS Alliance (P417), a fully preserved A-class submarine laid down in 1944 and completed in 1947, which visitors can board and explore in remarkable detail.

Guided tours take you through the cramped engine room, the torpedo tubes, the captain's bunk (barely wider than a shelf), and the control room where every dial and lever is still in place. The museum's wider collection covers the development of the submarine from hand-powered contraptions to nuclear vessels, with exhibits on the officers and ratings who served in them. It is the kind of museum where you leave with a genuine appreciation of what it took to crew these vessels.

Address: Haslar Jetty Road, Gosport PO12 2AS. Open daily, with guided tours of HMS Alliance at timed intervals.

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A story
The museum's centrepiece is HMS Alliance, a World War II-era A-class submarine that never fired a shot in anger but spent twenty-eight years on active service. Getting aboard means ducking through hatches barely wider than your shoulders, and the sheer claustrophobia of the control room — where dozens of men lived and worked for weeks at a time — is something no amount of description prepares you for.